Intel Splits from Microsoft on Digital TV

Share

Intel Splits from Microsoft on Digital TV

SANTA CLARA, Calif. - Intel Corp. executives Thursday unveiled a new vision for how digital television signals could enable a whole new generation of smart TV sets brimming with new interactive features.

Intel hopes a new transmission standard will bring fresh momentum to the emerging market for digital televisions, enabling consumers to order Christmas gifts or play videogames from the comfort of their living-room couch.

Intel executives told a gathering of reporters at the semiconductor giant's headquarters here that its new Open Digital Broadcast Initiative could enable broadcasters to choose from a variety of transmission formats. So far, the market has been retarded by a lack of agreement among technology providers about how to move forward.

Intel, using prototype devices, showed how its system could mix television signals with data by blending Internet standards with TV compression techniques to offer videogames and other interactive programs over broadcast signals delivered by cable, satellite, or terrestrial air waves.

Intel said the receiving devices could be incorporated into TV set-top boxes at various prices. Some would function more like personal computers and have enough data storage to let consumers store movies, for example, for viewing later.

"Your PC will watch TV for you," said Mike Richmond, business unit manager of broadcast products at Intel's Consumer Products Group. "The applications for a PC that watches TV for you would be enormous."

Instead of the complicated and costly central computers known as servers, which would be necessary to run "video on demand" for consumers to order movies and other programming, Intel executives said their design would enable people to select and store videos and other data as it is transmitted.

Video on demand, which had been viewed as the model for multimedia distribution five years ago, has proven too costly, but broadcasters could transmit content at regular intervals on a "carousel" model far more cost-effectively, Intel said.

Such transmissions could include software, videogames, and a host of entertainment and business services.

The storage feature would also let people "pause" a digital program for five or ten minutes for a "bathroom break," as with a videocassette recorder, and then return to the same part of the program on returning.

The attraction for Intel, which provides microprocessors that serve as the brains behind more than nine out of every ten personal computers shipped worldwide, is to open up a whole new market for its semiconductor products.

A year ago, Intel CEO Andy Grove used his Comdex keynote address to declare the PC industry was engaged in a "war for eyeballs" with traditional television.

Earlier this week, Intel president and chief operating officer Craig Barrett noted PC unit shipments have surpassed those of TVs in the United States in the past year, and were projected to exceed televisions on a worldwide basis soon.

But what remains to be seen is how Intel's proposal will be viewed by both broadcasters and the companies that will actually transmit digital broadcast signals.

Ron Whittier, senior vice president and general manager of Intel's Content Group, said the company is working with all major broadcast networks, in addition to its investment in a European multimedia satellite-transmission group.

An initiative launched last spring by Intel with partners Microsoft Corp. and Compaq Computer Corp. at a National Association of Broadcasters gathering quickly drew static from the trade organization, which said a US-approved plan had provided more flexibility than the trio proposed.

The Intel executives said their latest proposal had been developed to accommodate the criticisms of broadcasters, embracing all transmission formats using software translation coding to address the broadcast industry's concerns.

"The first point is, it's the TV, stupid," said Claude Leglise, a vice president of Intel's Content Group. "At the end of the day, it has to be able to run TV."

But it was not clear whether even Microsoft and Compaq, Intel's partners in the April Digital TV proposal, would jump on Intel's latest bandwagon.

Whittier said Intel is in talks with Compaq, and shares the Houston-based computer-maker's concern that the proposed standard could raise the cost of systems significantly. He said all three partners were engaged in a "healthy" discourse. "You have implementation partners having what I would consider normal implementation arguments," he said.

Officials at Microsoft and Compaq were not immediately available for comment, and Intel said it had not yet begun to seek formal backing from potential partners.

Intel demonstrated a number of implementations of the proposed technology, including Oracle Corp.'s NC device and sophisticated videogames made by Rage Software Plc, based in Manchester, England.

Intel said it expects digital-broadcast technology to play on a variety of operating systems and computer chips, not just those supplied by Intel and Microsoft.